Home ▸ RAW ▸ PUNK WINS! Monday Night RAW 6/30/08

It was bound to happen eventually, but I don’t think anybody expected it to happen last night.  As I’m typing this, I’m looking over my shoulder because my girlfriend is standing directly behind me, hasn’t seen RAW yet, and doesn’t know what happened, so I don’t want to spoil it for her.   She was with me at WrestleMania 24, she saw CM Punk win Money in the Bank live and in person, and we’ve watched him carry that briefcase around on television for the last three months, wondering when he’d cash it in.  Well, Edge found out the hard way last night, as he showed up on RAW and walked out minus one World Championship.  Even by the halfway point of the show, the WWE writers kept us guessing as to whether or not Punk would even leave with his newly won title in hand, but alas, he did.  When my girlfriend does see it, I might ruin it ever so slightly for her though.  See, she’s a Jeff Hardy fan – and if Jeff hadn’t violated the wellness policy and missed WrestleMania, he would be World Heavyweight Champion right now.  Think about that for a second.  Jeff Hardy could be World Champion.  Lesson for you kids:  Don’t do drugs!

RAW matches and highlights, discussed after the jump!
Shane McMahon starts off the show – and doesn’t tell us any new information about Mr. McMahon’s health.  Thanks Shane.  Thanks for nothing.

RAW kicked off with a familiar face – good ol’ JR was here to give a farewell speech to the fans of Monday Night RAW.  He asks that we join him on his journey to Friday Nights.  Then he’s interrupted by Edge.  Edge tells JR that he’s done yelling “STONE COLD, STONE COLD, STONE COLD,” and that from now on he’s going to have to yell “EDGE WINS, EDGE WINS, EDGE WINS!”  Edge asks him to try it out, but JR refuses – and is then escorted from the building by Hawkins and Ryder.  Edge says that RAW is missing a few things.  It’s missing a General Manager – unlike SmackDown which has Vicki Guerrero.  It’s missing The Undertaker – but then again, so is the entire WWE thanks to Edge.  Lastly, RAW is missing a World Championship – SmackDown has two, and the RAW superstars will never get a shot at his World Heavyweight Championship.

As Edge is leaving, Batista’s music hits, and he chases Edge down.  He catches the World Heavyweight Champion, and proceeds to beat the hell out of him, payback for the way things went down at Night of Champions.  The beatdown is capped with a Batista Bomb.  As the Animal is leaving, the music of C.M. Punk hits, and the Straight-Edge Superstar heads to the ring with a referee.  The referee has Lillian announce the title match, an impatient Punk begging the ref to hurry up and ring the bell.  As Edge is getting to his feet, he gets helped up by Punk – straight into a Go To Sleep.  Punk covers Edge and suddenly, RAW has a World Champion again – and his name is CM Punk!

Mickie James defended against Jillian Hall, and won a pretty decent match with a Mick Kick.

Up next, Rey Mysterio comes to the ring to tell everybody that after being around RAW for a while, he’s now starting to have fun.  Then he’s interrupted by Santino Marella.  I don’t usually do this, but this is what Santino had to say:

“Any man who hides behind a mask is either incredibly ugly, incredibly stupid or is the Batman and you sir, you are not Bat Man!”

After Santino tells Rey that he didn’t deserve to be on the cover of WWE Magazine, he asks for a response from Mysterio in a language we can all understand.  Rey then hits Santino in the head with the microphone, gives him a drop toehold into the ropes, and nails the 619.

Todd Grisham is standing by with the NEW World Heavyweight Champion, CM Punk.  Punk says he’s got a lot of things to do, and a lot of people to thank.  JBL shows up to tell him that he’s a paper champion, and that he wants Punk to prove himself by defending the title TONIGHT against JBL.  Punk accepts.

John Cena is up next, he says congratulations to CM Punk, and that he wants a shot instead of JBL.  Layfield comes out and tells Cena that he’s declaring Marshall Law, and that he’s going to have to have Cena escorted from the building.  He brings in his own security force, and has them remove Cena from the building.  Cena puts up a fight, but is unsuccessful, and JBL’s security force gets him out of the building.

Ted DiBiase and Cody Rhodes beat some jobbers.  Cody then explained why he turned on Bob Holly.  His father always told him to be patient, do things the right way.  When you’re as talented as Cody is though, you don’t have to pay dues.  That’s why he found Ted DiBiase – they’re young, handsome, and talented.  DiBiase says that people their age are too lazy to take advantage of situations, but not them.  That makes them Priceless.

Jamie Noble is hitting on Katie Lea Burchill backstage.  He says he’s going to challenge the biggest, baddest man on RAW – who happens to be standing right behind him.  Noble tells Kane he’d better not catch him going through his bag and listening to his Larry The Cable Guy tapes.  Kane grabs Noble by the throat, and Noble retreats to the arena.  He tries to hide, to no avail.  Kane catches Noble and chokeslams him in the center of the ring.

Chris Jericho blames Shawn Michaels for his loss to Kofi Kingston last night.  He challenges him to a match at the Great American Bash.  For now though, it’s time to get the Intercontinental Championship back.  A back and forth match between Y2J and Kofi Kingston leads to a pin attempt by Jericho, holding the tights – the referee catches him and calls for the bell – Kofi Kingston retains by DQ.  Jericho goes nuts, and tries to dig Kofi’s eyes out.

We see footage from earlier in the night, Edge blames Hawkins and Ryder for his loss, and the three of them leave the building.

JBL makes his way out with his security force to take on the World Heavyweight Champion, CM Punk.  JBL had the match well in hand, but Punk battled back.  John Cena and Cryme Time made their way to the ring to negate JBL’s security force.  The battle on the outside distracted JBL – who was then dropped with a GTS, and Punk retains the World Heavyweight Championship!  Punk dives over the top rope and lands on everybody to end the show.

Wow.  I never expected to be sitting here talking about CM Punk being the World Heavyweight Champion right now.  I thought RAW was great last night – and I mean the entire show.  I know last week I said RAW was great because it was mostly wrestling matches, but tonight’s show, despite being mostly promos and only four matches (if you even want to count Punk vs. Edge as a match), may have been even better.  It could just be the euphoria from seeing Punk win the title from Edge, but I doubt it.  Even Cody Rhodes didn’t suck last night.  It’s time for the young stars to take over, and a quick look at RAW’s champions tells us that’s exactly what’s happening – CM Punk is your 29 year old Heavyweight Champion, Kofi Kingston is a young guy who is your Intercontinental Champion, and Ted DiBiase (age 25) and Cody Rhodes (age 23) are your World Tag Team Champions.  More shows like last night’s and last week’s, and the ratings will skyrocket for the flagship show of the WWE.

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